Persisting with the God of the gaps things is a nonsense J70 especially when it is started off life as a derogatory term for people of weak faith. Its what drove you to reject faith in the first place as a youngster so I guess if I felt the same way I'd be clinging to it too.
Faith comes from within that all I can say.
Why do you believe that only the empirical realm exists, in fact what is your rationale for believing that it exists at all? instinct?
Why do you belief in a solely material and naturalistic cosmos esp when massive holes have been blown in it by quantum mechanics and relativity? Not to mention the existence of our good selves.
If "faith" comes from within, I'm clearly lacking something then Joe, aren't I? As are many other people.
And the god of the gaps issue clearly addresses the fact that various cultures over the millennia have attributed cause and effect for a multitude of stuff to whatever god(s) they believed were pulling the strings. Why do we dismiss the beliefs of the ancient Romans or Egyptians or, more recently, pre-christian Native Americans, or various modern day faiths other than our own, but draw the line when it comes to our own particular religion? Why is this ok, but questioning the actual existence of god(s) is so problematic? Is there a different set of judgement/assessment rules required for the latter?
On the general perception/reality stuff, we've discussed that a few times before. I do not have the time to get sucked into a week-long back and forth with you rehashing the same stuff. Its already there on the board for anyone who is interested.
I dont want to tell you anything about yourself J70 but I believe everyone has faith inside them.
When you say you for example what are you talking about? your body, your brain?, your millions cells, your genome, your 1000s miles of DNA strings, the trillions of atoms, your quarks. Most of which (certainly all of the later two) are not the same ones as occupied the space where you imagine you to have occupied last year or probably even last month.
All of which have come about and behave in a way entirely controlled by nature after somehow all being set in motion at the big bang.
Or do you believe there is an independent you that thinks for himself and makes his own decisions, has relationships, cares for things, or even experiences things.. well just like God science has found no evidence of these things existing whatsoever even tho ironically enough its existance completely on the last one.
I wouldn't say that their inner faith is wrong as such either, it was just reflected outwardly in a different way. I must have said that 100 times on here, but the same people keep asking me that same question.